104 posts categorized "QuickBooks Reports"

It can take even more time if you accept credit cards, and your merchant service provider takes the credit card fees out of EACH transaction!

Spend less time on bank reconciliations with the following tip.

LET ME EXPLAIN...

Let's say that you ring up a sale for $100 today and the customer pays via credit card.

When this deposit shows up in your bank statement, does it show up for the full $100? Or does it show up for something like $97.54 because the processor has taken their fee out of it right then and there?

If it is the latter where they are taking out the fees for each transaction, stop what you are doing and call them right now.

Ask to have your merchant service account fees set up on the "gross fees" basis instead of the "net fees" basis.

Under the "gross fees" basis, in the example above, you would see the full $100 being deposited into your bank account (the full "gross amount" is deposited). Your merchant service provider would then just hit your bank account once per month for the total of all the credit card fees for the month, and NOT take them out on a transaction by transaction basis.

Naturally, the merchant service provider normally defaults to the "net fees" basis, since they get paid faster that way. All it usually takes is a phone call to get it switched around!

The big benefit to you? Your $100 deposit will now reconcile on the bank statement in a nano-second!!

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Take a closer look at the following screen shots out of a sample QuickBooks item list (could just as easily be a view of the QuickBooks customer/job list):

View #1:

View #2:

Feel like you are at the eye doctor?

See any difference? (hope so!!)

"HIERARCHICAL" (INDENTED) VIEW VS. FLAT VIEW

When looking at view #1 above, you are looking at what QuickBooks refers to as the "hierarchical" view of the item list (I like to call it the indented view). Whatever you may call this view, it is visually representing that there is an "item/sub-item" relationship going on here.

In this case, Bath/Vanity Fixture is the main item, so it sits at the top of the list. Below it, you see the subitems, such as item # 5029-03-55. These sub-items show up being indented on the list so you can visually see they belong to the parent item above it.

QuickBooks provides this view (and the corresponding item/sub item or customer/job if looking at customers) so you can easily group similar things together within the list - makes for easier viewing and easier filtering of the list data in many cases.

View #2 represents the "flat" view of the list information. There is no indenting going on - all of the item numbers are showing up "flat" up against the left hand side of the list.

CHANGING THE VIEW DOESN'T CHANGE THE UNDERLYING DATA

You can easily switch from hierarchical to flat view and back by simply right clicking on the list and choosing the view you prefer, as shown below:

Keep in mind that the view you choose does not affect the data itself. If you have items/subitems or customers/jobs set up, those relationships will stay just as they are.

AND IN CASE YOU SEE THIS...

If you go to do some searching within your customer/job list, you'll then see the list automatically switched over to the flat view of the information. I'm not sure exactly why that happens, but you can easily reset the view by right clicking inside the customer/job list and resetting it back to hierarchical/indented view.

A number of inquiries have come in lately asking about "merging" two or more QuickBooks files together, and whether it could be done or not.

The better question to ask before asking if it could be done is...

"Should it be done?

Should you really merge two QuickBooks files together?"

MERGE VS. IMPORT

To make sure we're on the same page here, let's get a few definitions out of the way first (at least how I see them).

Merge - to actually combine ALL the contents of separate QuickBooks files together so that one QuickBooks file remains

Import - to selectively choose information (i.e. customers, inventory) and extract it from one QuickBooks file and pull it into another QuickBooks file

TO MERGE OR NOT TO MERGE

Over the years, I've heard many different scenarios where someone wants to merge QuickBooks files together.

To my original question about "should" you merge them?

My answer is a resounding NO.

Here's why I say you should NOT merge QuickBooks files together...

There is no direct way to accomplish this - no magic button exists within QuickBooks to merge files

The integrity of the file that is being merged into is completely lost - I shudder to think about the consequences of smashing two QuickBooks files together into one (try running historical financial reports after the merge - I think your CPA would have cardiac arrest at that point!)

If there is a legitimate need to combine the information from two or more QuickBooks files, my suggestion is to create a brand new QuickBooks file as of a certain point in time (i.e. new fiscal year, beginning of a quarter, etc.). Leave the history in the old files for lookup purposes, and put future transactions in the new file. I think this will save you a ton of grief in the long run.

IMPORTING/PULLING INFORMATION INTO A NEW QUICKBOOKS FILE?

There are several ways to pull information from one QuickBooks file or external source to another QuickBooks file, including:

Even though these tools exist, it is still absolutely essential that you understand what they do, how they may impact existing information, and make sure that everyone is on board (including your outside accountant) about how your historical information may or may not change as a result of importing information into QuickBooks.

AGREE? DISAGREE?

You've read my take on merging QuickBooks files.

What's your take? Do you agree? Disagree?

Please drop your comments in the box below (or if you are reading this via e-mail, click the "view in browser" link to get to the comments box)

Life lessons. They’re never ending. There’s the stuff that you’d like to learn like paddle boarding, pasta rolling, conversational Spanish, and there’s the stuff that you have to learn, like web design, drywall hanging, and programming the DVR. We’re guessing sales tax falls into the latter category. Because, let’s face it, unless you’re a member of Mensa (or a masochist), sales tax is hard. And boring.

But now it doesn’t have to be. Avalara wrote the book on making sales tax easy. No seriously, we did. Okay, we had a little help on the “easy” part from the folks at For Dummies. Yes! That’s right; those massively popular bright yellow and black books that that offer useful instruction on, well, everything.

Odds are you’re familiar with For Dummies. Hard not to be, with more than 1,800 titles to choose from on everything from sushi to sewing to search engines and now (with Avalara’s help) sales tax.

The beauty of these DIY guides is that they take topics that are inherently overwhelming to most of us and condense them down into something digestible. Who doesn’t love that? Sales & Use Tax Compliance for Dummies is a 49-page powerhouse of plain speak on everything sales tax from understanding nexus (the obligation to collect sales tax based on sales activities) to product taxability to proving tax exemption to registration and returns filing. There’s helpful tips to avoid costly mistakes that could led to an audit and practical reasons to consider automated tax software to make compliance easier to manage.

It’s a simple, straightforward look at a not-so-simple problem and a primer on why getting sales tax right is so important—and so hard to do on your own. There’s counsel for businesses of all types and sizes on how to make this process easier and business cases for tax-decisioning software that works right in the financial systems you already use in your business—from QuickBooks for smaller businesses to ERP or ecommerce systems for larger companies with more complex selling structures.

If so, have you ever noticed that the cost of those adjustments does NOT show up on the job profitability summary report? (hopefully you noticed that is, or you are having a major "oh crap moment right now!!)

Strange, isn't it? You'd think that if you set up the transaction properly, the information would flow automatically to the report.

If you choose to use "pending invoices" to track open/unshipped orders in QuickBooks, you'll want to know about the Pending Sales Report.

Located by clicking Reports > Sales > Pending Sales, you can quickly and easily see a list of all your pending invoices in one place, as shown in the sample screenshot below:

WHY NOT USE SALES ORDERS INSTEAD?

During a recent consulting call with a client, we were discussing their use of "pending invoices" to track open orders.

I asked them why they weren't using sales orders for this purpose. They indicated they didn't really know about the sales order functionality in QuickBooks (Premier and Enterprise versions), so didn't think to use them.

Once we reviewed the sales order process, they immediately saw many benefits to this approach over the use of pending invoices, including:

The ability to see open sales orders both by customer and by item

The ability to see inventory demand on sales orders appearing on the inventory stock status report

The ability to use the sales order fulfillment worksheet to visualize and prioritize shipments

If your business has a need to track open and unshipped/unfilled orders, I definitely recommend the sales order approach over the pending invoice approach.